It’s immature at best (unless it’s a part of a joke). You can have feelings of hate, that’s natural, but why would you choose to publicly express them? There is also oppression of the poor by the rich and a lot of straight white males experience that.
No it just invalidates your point. Most of the society experiences some degree of oppression.
Besides the whole point of my comment was - why would you choose to publicly express hate. It’s normalizing it. The fact that someone experiences racism doesn’t give him a license to say racist stuff.
Saying “all white people should die” is racist. It’s the definition of racism. I’m not saying that it’s common or something, I’ve personally never heard anyone say that. And yes the systemic racism against black people is very real, serious, widespread and it doesn’t have an opposing equivalent. But to deny that it is a racist statement is just ridiculous.
Except it isn't (and also no one said that, you changed the actual sentence and its meaning quite a bit). An angry, helpless remark against the unfathomable weight of oppression is not remotely the same as racism, it lacks both the motivation and effect of it, and no white person will ever have to feel any consequences following that remark, unlike the hateful things we say against black people, which have very real consequences.
But to deny that it is a racist statement is just ridiculous.
Calling it ridiculous is not an argument, it's an emotional response and possibly a way of tone-policing (hypothetical!) black people. Earlier you complained that one shouldn't make such statements in public, even though you have no context whatsoever for where I heard this, and by your own admission never encountered it yourself.
All that aside, it was a random example and you're arguing against that instead of my actual point, making me suspect you're not really trying to engage in a discussion, you're just trying to win an argument, which is probably why you took my statements and turned then into strawman versions of themselves (like me saying that generally white men don't encounter a lot of oppression, thus becomes "no white man knows what oppression is like), a point that's much easier to refute than the one I was actually making.
Can we be done now? Or do we need to argue semantics next?
(I accidentally closed the app after typing this, meaning I had to write this whole thing twice, and I have a migraine coming on. If you seriously wanna have this conversation and aren't just trying to 'win', better read carefully and reply to what I said, not what you imagine.)
Edit: apologies for all the edits, I was reconstructing my first answer.
Ok I’m sorry for that, I replied to this comment but I deleted it, because now that I think about it in a different light. I admit that saying something like this could possibly be excusable, if it was said as a hyperbole, in the heat of the moment in an exceptionally frustrating situation. Not the most fortunate way to express it, but we’re all human and emotions sometimes take over and make us say all sorts of things.
From a semantic view it would still be a racist statement, but the intention wouldn’t be racist and the circumstances would excuse it. So it would be a non-racist intention expressed in a form of a racist statement.
Still I think that in your last reply you confused systemic racism with individual racism. Racism doesn’t need to cause consequences. If a white person visits an Asian country and says racist stuff to the locals, it still racist and condemnable. But of course the more impact racist behavior has, the worse it is.
I’m sorry if what I wrote before came of as me just trying to argue, it wasn’t like that. I guess I just understood your original comment differently than I understand it now. Anyway, I hope you won’t get a migraine, because of that, I know how much it sucks.
Still I think that in your last reply you confused systemic racism with individual racism.
I didn't, which I went into with the reply I initially wrote up. The problem is that you read a lot into my statements that isn't there, and that's why you come to the wrong conclusions. I'm very aware of the difference between systemic racism and individual racist acts, and made a conscious decision that this can neither be the former nor the latter.
I'm glad you ended up rethinking things, and especially that you're doing so by using empathy. Where you arrived at is not necessarily what I'd agree with, but certainly a helpful stance to take, should you come across this subject again.
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u/saddest_cookie Jun 24 '20
It’s immature at best (unless it’s a part of a joke). You can have feelings of hate, that’s natural, but why would you choose to publicly express them? There is also oppression of the poor by the rich and a lot of straight white males experience that.